


The Dismal Detention

by Alice_Writes_Stuff



Series: Stain'd Girls (Derry Girls AU) [1]
Category: A Series of Unfortunate Events (TV), A Series of Unfortunate Events - Lemony Snicket, All the Wrong Questions - Lemony Snicket
Genre: Alternate Universe - High School, Derry Girls AU, F/M, Inspired by the first episode of Derry Girls, M/M, Multi, Set in Stain'd-By-The-Sea
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-02-16
Updated: 2020-02-16
Packaged: 2021-02-28 03:01:08
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,839
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/22746700
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Alice_Writes_Stuff/pseuds/Alice_Writes_Stuff
Summary: The first day of term can already be an unpleasant experience- but for Violet, Klaus, Isadora, Fiona and new girl Carmelita, it's about to get way worse, thanks to a stolen diary, a tough twelve-year-old and an unfortunate coincidence...
Relationships: Beatrice Baudelaire/Bertrand Baudelaire/Lemony Snicket, Klaus Baudelaire/Duncan Quagmire, Violet Baudelaire/Quigley Quagmire
Series: Stain'd Girls (Derry Girls AU) [1]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/1832224
Comments: 3
Kudos: 14





	The Dismal Detention

“My name is Violet Baudelaire. I'm 17 years old, and I live in a little town called Stain’d-By-The-Sea, a place with a long and complicated history. I think it’s safe to say my own relationship with my hometown is complicated too- the thing about living in Stain’d is because it’s such a small town, there’s nowhere to hide. Everyone knows everyone, knows everything about everybody, and sometimes all I want is to just be left alone...”

Violet jerked awake, at first not quite registering what she was seeing. Sure enough, there was her half brother, Klaus, sitting on the stool next to her dressing table and reading her diary. Out loud. 

“Klaus, what do you think you’re doing?” She jumped out of bed, and grabbed the book out of his hand. 

“You shouldn’t have left it out in the open like that!” Klaus countered. He was already dressed in his school uniform- Violet had almost forgotten it was the first day back. 

“Never mind, just get lost and let me get ready!” They were supposed to be meeting Isadora and her brothers soon, then getting the bus with Fiona, and she didn’t want to be late. 

“You won’t be too long, will you? I wanna get to school early.” Violet rolled her eyes, and grabbed her hairbrush off the dressing table. 

“Of course you do- and that wouldn’t have anything to do with the fact that the Quagmires are back from their holiday, and you wanna see Duncan, would it?” 

“Shut up,” Klaus muttered, turning red. “You’re just as bad with Quigley.”

Later, the siblings were downstairs, sitting at the breakfast table. 

“I still can’t believe you were _reading my diary,_ ” Violet sighed, winding her purple hair ribbon around one wrist. “That’s just going too far, isn’t it, Mum?” 

“It’s not so bad- everyone does it, Violet,” said her father. “I used to read your Auntie Kit’s diary all the time.”

He and her uncle Bertrand- though he wasn’t her biological uncle, he was Klaus’s father, and the father of their baby sister, Sunny- were sitting at the table too, on either side of Granny Theodora. The wild-haired old woman wasn’t technically the children’s grandmother, but she had all but raised Uncle Bert, and been a foster mother to Violet’s father for a few months when he’d been a teenager.

“That doesn’t make it okay though, Dad!” 

“That’s true enough,” he conceded.

“I’m telling you, though, I won’t put up with it any more! Teenagers have rights, you know!” That got her mother’s attention.

“Don’t be ridiculous, Violet.” Violet was about to say something, but Uncle Bert, who’d been watching the news, spoke up before she could. 

“Did you hear that?” he asked, gesturing to the screen. “The bridge nearly blew away in that storm last night.” Sure enough, the reporter on the screen was talking about a major traffic jam, and flooding on the road leading up to the bridge.

“Does this mean the children won’t be able to get to school?” their mother asked. “I hope not, I’ve had a whole summer of these two, they’re driving me crazy.” 

“The bus can take them the long way round, Bea,” Dad pointed out. 

“Maybe you should drive them, do something useful for once,” Grandma Theodora countered. 

“Because I have to go to work, you know that.” 

“Work? Is that what you call it, scribbling away at those stupid stories?” 

“Mum, I’m an investigative journalist- the stories are more of a side project at the moment, you know that!” 

“Right, well, we’d better be going,” Violet said, getting to her feet. Once Dad and Grandma Theodora got going, there would be no stopping them. She grabbed her denim jacket and shrugged it on. 

“And what do you call that?” Mum demanded, pointing at the jacket. 

“I’ve decided to put my own twist on the uniform this year, that’s all!” Violet replied, starting to button up the jacket. 

“I’ll show you a twist, now get your blazer on!” 

“Look, Mum, I’m not a clone. I should be allowed to express my individuality. Now, I’m not gonna wear my blazer, and that’s the end of the matter.”

“Bertrand, would you mind handing me the wooden spoon?” That shut her up. 

Ten minutes later, Violet and Klaus were walking down the road, in their regular maroon blazers. At the end of the road, they saw their friends, the Quagmire triplets. Isadora was wearing a denim jacket, and her face fell when she saw that Violet wasn’t wearing one. 

“I thought we were being individuals this year!” she said, when the five teens caught up with each other. 

“I wanted to, Isa, but our mom wouldn’t let me.” Isadora sighed, and shrugged out of her jacket, pulling her blazer out of her bag and putting it on instead. 

“Well, I’m not being an individual by myself!” she replied, shoving her jacket into her bag. 

The teens walked along to the corner shop, to grab some sweets before they got on the bus. Klaus and Duncan hung back a little to chat, and Violet tried to talk to Isadora, while also shooting glances at Quigley, who was walking beside them, carrying a roll of papers under his arm. She tucked her hair behind both ears, then brought it forward to cover her ears, then tucked one side behind one ear. Quigley didn’t seem to notice any change. 

“Violet?” Isadora said, grabbing her arm. “We’re here.” She pushed open the door to the corner shop, and they all went in. 

“Are you not getting anything, Isadora?” Violet asked a couple of minutes later, after they’d all looked over the selection of sweets. 

“I can’t, Violet, I’m doing this fast thing for charity.”

“You weren’t serious about that, were you?” Duncan asked, handing over his money for his bag of sweets. 

“Of course I was serious! Remember that charity appeal video we saw the other day?” She turned to Violet. “You should’ve seen it, all those poor, starving kids! It really makes you think, doesn’t it?” 

“Yes, it does- about ways to help fight world hunger that don’t involve skipping Mum’s start of year pancakes,” Duncan countered. 

“At least Mum agreed to sponsor me, which is more support than some people gave me.” She sighed. “Would either of you like to sponsor me?” Klaus agreed, reluctantly setting down the bag he’d been planning to fill with sweets, but Violet didn’t, having already spent the money she had on her own bag. 

When they got outside, Quigley was putting up posters for a concert he and his band were playing tonight

“Er… that’s a… that’s a cool poster. Really nice use of… letters.” Violet closed her eyes, cringing at how awkward that sounded. _Nice use of letters?_ Seriously, what was _wrong_ with her? 

“Um, thanks,” Quigley replied. “You should come along- if you think the poster’s neat, the gig itself will be even better.” 

“Yeah, that sounds great!” 

“But Violet,” Klaus cut in, frowning. “Murder, She Wrote is on tonight! You never miss Murder, She Wrote!” 

“I’m sure it won’t matter if I miss one episode!” She turned back to Quigley. “Thanks for inviting me!” she said, and managed to walk away with most of her dignity intact.

The group made their way to the bus stop, where their friend Fiona was waiting, along with a short girl with curly red hair. 

“What’s up, motherfuckers?” Fiona called, waving to them. 

“What?” Violet asked. Fiona didn’t normally swear. 

“That’s my thing now, motherfuckers! It’s from this film Fernald let me watch last night.” Fernald was Fiona’s older brother by about fourteen years, but he’d been her legal guardian since she was four, because their parents were both dead, and their stepfather had been terrible. 

“Never mind that,” Violet replied. “Who’s the redhead?”

“Carmelita Spats,” the girl introduced herself, holding out her hand. They all shook it politely. 

“What brings you to Stain’d-By-The-Sea, Carmelita?” Duncan asked. 

“She and her cousin moved here about a week ago- it was kinda similar to me and Fernald, a huge age gap, terrible parents, all that jazz. They’re staying in the Bed and Breakfast next door, and I agreed to walk in with her on the first day.” Violet nodded, and they all filed onto the bus. 

Fiona guided them towards the back of the bus, where, unfortunately, a group of younger students had already claimed the seats. 

“This is not on- we’re juniors, we shouldn’t have to put up with this,” Fiona muttered. Duncan and Quigley, as if they sensed where this was going, broke off from the group. 

“If you lot want to get into a fight with a bunch of twelve-year-olds, you can go right ahead, but we’re having no part in it.” And with that, he and Quigley walked back down the bus, and slid into two seats near the front. The others, however, continued on their path. 

“Move,” Fiona snapped, pointing at the girl in the middle of the row and jerking her thumb back over her shoulder. 

“Or what, Triangle Eyes?” the girl replied, smiling calmly up at them. 

“Or we’ll beat you up!” Surprisingly, this threat came from Carmelita, not from Fiona.

“Do it, then,” she replied, clearly not threatened by the admittedly tiny new kid. “Beat me up.” 

“Well, I mean, we obviously can’t do it right now,” Fiona said, stalling for time. “But after school, we will!” 

“Great! I’ll meet you after school, and you can beat me up. I’ll bring my big brother, Stew Mitchum. He’s in the year above you lot, I think- perhaps you know him?” 

_“Big Stew_ is your brother?” Fiona asked. It was beginning to dawn on all five of them just how much trouble they were in. 

“That’s right,” the girl replied, now smiling brightly. 

“Look, I think there’s been a bit of a misunderstanding here,” Violet said. 

“I thought you might say that- now get lost.” With a sigh, the four girls- and Klaus- went back down the bus to take different seats. 

“Well, I hope _that_ was worth the trouble,” Duncan said, once they sat down. 

“We are in so much shit,” Violet muttered, turning to look out of the window. 

* * *

As if determined to prove them right, once they entered the school, Esmé Squalor, school prefect and insufferable show-off, came up to them. 

“Violet, Klaus, Isadora, Fiona and… new girl, can I have a word, please?” Sensing a chance to escape Esmé’s wrath, Duncan and Quigley quickly made their exit. “Now, part of my role as prefect is to welcome students to their first year at Prufrock. So, I’m sure you can all understand why, when I heard that there had been an incident this morning involving an impressionable young student and five juniors who threatened to beat her up, I was a bit concerned.” 

“Well, we didn’t mean anything by it,” Fiona countered. “We just meant it as a joke.” 

“But that’s not really funny, is it? Like, at all?” she sighed. “Now, Sophie is saying that she’s not really bothered, but reading between the lines, I’m not too sure that I believe her. Now, I really don’t want to have to report you guys- but I think I’ll have to mull it over.” 

“Hey, prefect, mull _this_ over!” Carmelita said, flipping her off. Fiona had to drag her away, before she could do any more damage to their situation. 

Later, when they were in the library, Violet tried to persuade at least one of them to go to Quigley’s gig with her. She waited until Quigley had gone to grab another atlas from the geography section before asking, though, so he wouldn’t overhear her. 

“For the last time, Violet, I don’t wanna go to that stupid gig! I don’t see why I should have to, when Duncan and Isadora are going- and when we all know that you’re just going to sit there in the corner like a dumb purple potted plant,” Fiona said.

“She’s not wrong,” Klaus added. “You’ve never even kissed a boy before. You practice on your pillow, but you don’t think that’s the same.” 

“Look, it’s bad enough that you read my diary in the first place- do you _really_ have to start quoting it from memory, too?” Just then, an announcement came over the school intercom. 

“Would the following students please make their way to Vice Principal Nero’s office? Violet Baudelaire, Klaus Baudelaire, Fiona Widdershins, Isadora Quagmire and Carmelita Spats?” 

“You have got to be kidding me,” Violet muttered, getting to her feet. 

Once the five of them were seated outside the Vice Principal’s office, the worry about how much trouble they were actually in started to really hit them. 

“I need to use the bathroom,” Klaus muttered. 

“Go, then- nobody’s stopping you,” Violet replied. 

“No, cause if I do that now, you’ll all be called in before I get back, and I’ll be in even bigger trouble.”

“You don’t think we’ll get expelled, do you?” Carmelita asked, fiddling with one of her red curls. 

“Carmelita, nobody actually gets expelled around here,” Fiona replied, sighing. 

“Okay,” Isadora said, rubbing her stomach. “Whatever happens in there, we have got to stick together. We’ve gotta back each other up no matter what, alright?”

Just then, the door opened and the five teens were ushered into the vice principal’s office, where it did not take long for Isadora’s resolve to break. 

“So, this had nothing to do with me. Yes, OK, I was there, I admit that, but I didn't do anything! It was Fiona, it was all Fiona! I'm not going down for something I didn't do! If anyone deserves to get punished, it should be Fiona!”

 _“If anyone should be punished it should be Fiona,”_ Vice Principal Nero mimicked. “Well,” he said, tapping his violin bow against the desk. “I think it’s safe to say we all just lost a bit of respect for you there, Isadora.” he set the bow down for a moment, frowning at them. “This is very disappointed, children. Threatening a sixth-grader like that!” 

“We didn’t threaten her!” Fiona protested. “Why would we do that? Big Stew’s her brother, and he’s half bloody gorilla!” 

“ _He’s half bloody gorilla!_ That is more than enough from you, Miss Widdershins!” 

“Look, sir, it was all just a misunderstanding,” Violet said, trying to smooth things over. 

“ _Was_ it a misunderstanding, Sophie?” 

“Look- I don’t even know why we’re all here, I’m not the one who reported them. I’m not gonna say anything more at this point.” 

“ _I’m not gonna say anything more at this point._ Well, in that case, I don’t see any reason to take this matter any further. Of course, if I hear about anything like this happening again, that’ll be a different matter.” 

“You won’t, sir, we promise.” 

“ _You won’t, sir, we promise._ Now, I think you all owe Sophie an apology, don’t you?” They all made their apologies. “Sophie, do you accept their apologies?” 

“Do I have to?” she asked. 

“No, you don’t have to.”

“Well, in that case, I don’t accept it,” she said, folding her arms. 

“ _In that case I don’t accept it._ Well, I need to draw a line under this somehow, so...” 

And that was how Violet, Klaus, Isadora, Fiona and Carmelita managed to get detention on the first day of term.

* * *

“This is not happening,” Violet sighed, looking out the window. “I can’t believe I’m gonna miss Quigley’s gig because you two couldn’t keep your mouths shut, and had to flip Esmé off on top of threatening a sixth-grader.” 

“I really didn’t think this through,” Klaus muttered. “I should’ve just gone earlier and taken my chances.” 

“Will you shut up, Klaus? None of us are having a good time here,” Violet replied, before frowning up at the clock. 

“She’s right...” said Isadora. “I’m getting weaker by the second… I don’t think I can last much longer...” 

“Oh for the love of sanity, Isadora! You’ve basically just skipped lunch!” Just then, Violet caught sight of what her brother was reading, noticing its familiar, bright purple cover. 

“Klaus, that had _better_ not be what I think it is! You’d better not have brought my diary to school!” 

“I had to- I’m doing my book report on it. Now, will you shut up and let me focus? If I’m reading this, I won’t be thinking about _other things._ ” 

Violet, however, did not have the patience to deal with this on top of everything else. She got up out of her seat and tried to grab the diary, only for Klaus to hold it out of her arm’s reach. 

“What’s going on here?” demanded Ms. Murphy, the elderly drama teacher in charge of overseeing detention this evening. 

“Nothing, Miss. Klaus just won’t give me my diary back.” 

“I’ll take that,” she said, plucking the book from Klaus’s hand and taking it back to her desk. She looked around at the five of them. “Mr. Baudelaire, for the last time, you can have a restroom break when I say you can have one, not a moment sooner. And Miss Widdershins, I’ll take that lipstick right now- you know the rules about make-up. The rest of you, behave yourselves until detention is over.” And with that, she sat down at her desk, and started to flip through the pages of Violet’s diary. 

“You have got to be kidding me,” she grumbled, glaring at their teacher, who appeared not to notice. In fact, she appeared to have fallen asleep at her desk. 

“Wow, would you look at that, Violet! Your stupid diary must’ve put her to sleep,” Fiona said, getting to her feet. “Right, I’m getting my lipstick back.” 

By now, they had all reached their limits. Klaus made a beeline for the waste paper basket, and everyone looked away as they realised what he was doing. 

“What kind of school is this?” Carmelita asked, frowning at them. 

“A good fucking question,” Violet replied, standing up. “Right, if I leave now, I might still be able to catch Quigley’s gig.” She went over to the large window and pulled it open. Meanwhile, Fiona was rifling through Ms. Murphy’s handbag, and Isadora was eating what was left of her sandwich. Violet sighed, and lifted one leg up over the windowsill. She was about to move the other one, when Carmelita spoke up.

“Does anyone else think it’s weird that our teacher sleeps with her eyes wide open?” Violet turned her head to see the new girl holding up the teacher’s head, just as the door swung open.

“What on Earth is going on in here?” demanded an all too familiar voice.

* * *

Once again, the five unfortunate teens found themselves in the vice principal’s office- only this time, they were waiting for their families to show up. The Baudelaire-Snicket-Markson clan came first, and Violet noticed that Grannie Theodora was carrying baby Sunny.

“Violet, there had better be a good explanation for what’s happened here- you’d better not have actually killed that teacher," Mum said, once the four adults and one infant had entered the office. 

“Of course we didn’t kill her, Mum!” Violet replied, and Klaus nodded emphatically. 

“Then why were you peeing on her dead body and making sandwiches?” Uncle Bert asked. 

“Bertrand!” Granny Theodora admonished, before turning to the teens. “Say nothing, all of you, until we can get a lawyer.” Before any of them could say anything, the door opened, and Fiona’s brother Fernald came in. 

“Sorry I’m late, I couldn’t get over that stupid bridge. You know they’re not even letting you walk across it, they’re saying it’s still too dangerous. They’ve been at it all day, how long does it take?” 

“Health and safety gone mad,” Grannie Theodora commented. 

“Excuse me,” Carmelita said. “Do you know if Brandon’s coming?” Fernald frowned, and shook his head. 

“No, sorry, he had to work.” He turned to Fiona. “Would you like to explain _why_ you were going through a dead woman’s handbag?” 

“She took my lipstick! I was just getting it back!” 

“Don’t be ridiculous- why would a respected teacher steal from a student?” 

“Well, actually, she was known to be a bit light fingered,” Nero said. He looked around, counting the adults. “None for Spats, one for Widdershins, and four for the Baudelaires. So that just leaves us with the Quagmire,” he said, and as if he had summoned him, Mr. Quagmire came into the room. 

“The bridge again?” Nero asked, like he didn’t think that was a valid reason to be late to a meeting like this. 

“Yes,” Mr. Quagmire said, before turning to Isadora. “Since when did you start killing teachers, and missing your brother’s concerts?” 

“It wasn’t my fault, Dad! I didn’t have anything to do with this!” 

“You wait till your mother hears about this!” Nero waited until all the adults were sitting down, before beginning to speak. 

“Obviously, Ms. Murphy’s death was extremely shocking and unexpected. We're still struggling to understand exactly what happened.” Violet raised her hand. Nero rolled his eyes, but let her ask her question.

“Can I just ask, how old was Ms. Murphy when she died?”

“ _How old was Ms-_ She'd have been 98 on Friday,” Nero replied, remembering that he wasn’t the only adult in the room and couldn’t mock the students with his usual impunity.

“Right. Might that shed some light on the situation?” Violet asked, twisting her ribbon around her fingers and getting more and more irritated. “I mean, does anyone else have any thoughts on the whole "her being almost 98 years of age" thing?” 

“It sounds like she was struck down in her prime,” commented Granny Theodora, gently lifting one of Sunny’s tiny hands away from her mass of grey hair. 

“The hospital are saying it was heart failure, but I have my doubts. As I said on the phone, the circumstances in which I found her body were strange, to say the least. So I've decided to carry out a full investigation into the incident.” The other adults nodded in approval.

“That makes sense,” Violet’s mother agreed. 

“What?” Violet exclaimed. “Nothing about this makes sense. The woman was almost 98 years of age. She had a heart attack. Why has everybody gone absolutely insane?” 

“There’s no need to be so rude, Violet,” her mother replied calmly. 

“We didn't do anything! It's not fair!” She sighed, and folded her arms, realising that it was pointless. Nobody was listening to her.

"But the thing is, life isn't fair. You see, injustice and prejudice are things I've become accustomed to- with a family as complicated as mine, how could it be otherwise? But I choose to rise above all of that. The path to peace is paved with tolerance and understanding. Violence is never the answer,” Klaus read aloud. Violet turned to glare at him, though she already knew what he’d be holding. 

“I am going to ram that so far up your ass!” she yelled, lunging for the book. Peace and tolerance, indeed!


End file.
